Rise, Ingenium the Fourth!
by JacksonRDoe
Summary: Tenya Iida always wanted to be the hero his brother, Ingenium the Third, had been all his life. This is the story of how he becomes Ingenium the Fourth, every bit the equal of his predecessor.
1. Chapter 1: Ready, Set, Go!

**Chapter 1: Ready, Set, Go!**

A thousand tons of steel abruptly emerged in the arena city the "heroes" had been fighting in. Whereas before, the heroes were cleaning out the mechanical monstrosities that had only been a few feet taller, this one was well out of their league. It crushed the top of an apartment building that never had any tenants, as if to demonstrate how powerless the heroes were.

The towering giant crushed all opposition in its way, destroying the very road it rolled on by its sheer mass. All the heroes that had clapped their eyes on it immediately turned around; here was an existence that was more natural disaster than obstacle. With a single punch, the street filled with dust, pushing the heroes back by sheer power.

Tenya Iida, not being an idiot, ran away. He had a practical to pass, a key part of the exam to get into UA, the most prestigious school of heroism bar none. There was no better school in all of Japan, for either heroism or just general studies. This practical was only graded on how many "villains" you destroyed, and nothing else. Taking down the big fat zero pointer currently annihilating the street would serve no purpose except hurting him unnecessarily and lowering his potential points by dint of wasted time.

His eyes flicked down to the right. A boy with striking green hair and a blue jumpsuit was on the ground. Hadn't he seen the insolent punk before? It had been nagging at him the whole day, that the applicant who had kept on mumbling during the presentation and tried to accost another applicant right before the practical.

It was of no consequence. He refocused his eyes forward, willing himself forward. The kid deserved it, after all the trouble he had made for everybody else, so it was okay to just leave him there, no matter what that little nagging voice said –

He stumbled, just a bit. Listening to himself think and taking his attention off the ruined road had made him miss a pothole, which was enough to make him stumble that brief step. He gave into his curiosity and threw a single glance back. The kid was crawling away, panicking at the one minute mark.

And then the kid stopped. Turned around and ran straight at it.

"What are you doing?! Are you trying to get yourself killed?!"

The kid ran on, heedless of his words. Iida quickly scanned the streets, double checking if there wasn't something he missed.

Suddenly, the street cleared of dust, and Iida could see what the kid had seen before he had; the girl with her foot trapped in the rubble. Iida knew he could keep destroying villains. He had earned forty some points up to this point, and could probably make fifty if he kept it up. But, that nagging voice grew louder.

 _"If not you, then who?", his brother, third holder of Ingenium, had said._

Tenya Iida only remembered that he had planned to be running away about halfway to the girl, flying down the street with jets of flame rocketing out of the back of his calves. New plan: he was going to get her out of the way and then get the idiot kid out of the way, because it was too early for them to suffer a career ending injury, and the girl had an interesting quirk. The exam could go on hold for this, surely. He didn't need to be number one, or get the highest score possible, because he knew that his brother would know when he told him, and his brother would be proud.

Speaking of which, where was the kid?

…

H-how?!

…

Where had this kid hid so much power?

The titan's face had a circular indentation from where the kid had punched. Fault lines spiderwebbed out from that indentation, spreading all over its face and body. Toppling over, the giant zero point villain started to explode as its fuel reserves crashed into engine components, or just cooked directly from the sheer power of that one punch.

Saying you could hear a pin drop wasn't quite right, because metal was crashing to the ground, creaking all the way, and a random smattering of explosives kept the environment noisy, but there was a distinct feeling of everybody who had ears and eyes in the city dropping their jaw on the ground.

(Present Mic was a pro hero, so when pushed, he said that no, he was totally composed and expecting this, thank you very much!)

Something was wrong though. The kid's right arm and legs were flopping around – did he just break his arm and legs with that power? No wonder he held back, he can't control that monster at all!

Tenya Iida finally picked his jaw up off the ground and dragged his eyes off the boy falling from the sky to haul the girl out of the rubble, shifting down from third gear into first gear.

No time for talking, or plans, just action. The girl was on the ground - that wouldn't do, grab by the scruff - gauge the distance to his landing location - within range of catch? - maybe - shift to second gear? not enough control.

The kid kept falling, but he had somehow, fighting through the pain of three broken limbs, pointed his finger at the ground, as if to flick the ground itself away.

Her gravity nullification was only a nullification of gravity's acceleration, not force. He was still falling at near terminal velocity. What did he have, what did he have? No choice for it, go for cushioning with body, jump and get quirk applied to self -

" _ **DETROIT SMASH!"**_

Iida panicked. The kid had pushed himself up and him down with air pressure. New plan, ground rapidly approaching, throw girl at kid -

The landing of angle was wrong, Iida's left wrist screaming in pain (gotta ignore it if he can), both people in a zone that he could crawl to. He'd have to.

Just had to cross a meter in three seconds. He could do this.

Clap up using only right hand. Get on knees, push, and use third gear to slide in under them -

The wind rushed out of his lungs as both of them used him as a human cushion. One hundred kilos was a pain to catch with your chest.

ESPECIALLY WHEN ONE OF THEIR ELBOWS WAS IN HIS SOLAR PLEXUS OW OW OW AND HIS WRIST AIIIEEEEE!

Iida gave himself a moment to soundlessly scream in pain while the human tangle of limbs worked themselves free of each other. At least it was taking pressure off of his solar plexus, but he decided to "help them along" by rolling over and depositing them on the road next to him. Now their teenager awkwardness was their problem, and his hands were clean of it. Should be entertaining -

Well, ignoring the rainbows spewing from her mouth and _he was not thinking about what she had for breakfast to make it that color._

Iida found himself slightly disappointed. Were they all so tired that they couldn't be bothered to do funny things?

(Recovery Girl would later conclude that he had a concussion)

"g-good, I did it. I-I-still need one point, i-if I could get … just one …" the kid said, pushing himself up with his left arm. His right arm was bent out of shape, his legs were bent all the wrong angles, and two rivers had streaked down the side of his whitened face, pupils turning into dots in his widened eyes. But he kept on pushing, no matter how weakly.

"You're... in no shape... to fight... most of... your limbs... are broken... are you... crazy?" Iida wheezed out.

"n-no… b-but..."

" _ **TIME UP!**_ ", Present Mic shouted.

"…"

The kid had finally fainted from pain and exhaustion. The look of dried tears across his face framed with striking green hair, with red flames flickering around him, reminded him of where he had seen this kid before.

 _"Look closely, dear brother, and look at the most heroic of them all." Tensei snapped out of his exercise routine to watch the news feed._

 _On the news, a villain had captured a civilian with a powerful explosive quirk and was currently terrorizing a street, lighting portions of the surrounding buildings on fire. Many heroes had shown up; Iida recognized Kamui Woods, Mount Lady, Death Arms, Backdraft, and others at the scene. Not one moved to save the boy or stop the villain. All of them were waiting for someone with a better quirk._

 _Except for one stupid civilian, who had broken through the throng of onlookers, charging straight at the sludge monster._

 _"Why isn't he using his quirk? And why isn't he letting the pros handle it?" Tenya, sticking around to watch his cool older brother and train like him, asked._

 _"Because, dear brother, he doesn't care if he has a quirk or not. He won't wait to save someone in need." Ingenium replied, grinning with a shine in his eye._

When Iida told the story to his awesome brother Tensei, that he had saved the boy who had impressed Tensei so much and had a totally awesome quirk, Tensei smiled, mussed his hair, and told him today, he was Ingenium's hero.

(He would spend the rest of the week denying that he had ever used the words "totally" and "awesome" in the same sentence. Tensei just chuckled at that.)

Iida was giddy for the whole rest of the week. He hadn't even bothered opening his acceptance letter.


	2. Prelude: Course Preview

**Prelude: Course Preview**

"Tenya, we need to have a talk."

The tone of his voice brooked no disagreement. He was standing in the bedroom door, backlit by one of the lights outside. In his hand was a letter…

Oh. Oh no. No no no not like this! His dreams of becoming Ingenium couldn't die here!

"I'm afraid that…"

Tenya's rapidly paling face made for such a funny image that Tensei decided to immortalize it right there and then. He didn't even need flash; the lamp that Tenya was studying by was enough to light his horror stricken face.

On second thought, leaving it on video would be a much better option, because then he'd get to see all the stages of his reaction.

"You've made it into UA!"

Shock, relief, anger, and then a pout all played across his face. Tensei allowed himself one cackle (his family was way too good at pretending to be villains) before schooling his expression.

"Seriously, though, we need to have The Talk."

"We covered that in sex ed, brother."

Tenya was still sulking about his joke. It was a bit nasty, if Tensei was being honest with himself, but he'd get over it soon enough.

"This one's about pros."

Tenya's head snapped up, eager with anticipation before he remembered that he was supposed to be sulking about Tensei's misleading choice of words.

Tensei gestured for Tenya to follow him. Again, Tenya jumped up, and then slouched when he remembered what he was supposed to be feeling. His attempts were comical in how seriously he took slouching.

-o-

"Let me cut to the point. You want to be Ingenium bad, right?"

Tenya nodded. His brother, leaning forward in his maximum serious face (When pushed by Tensei about his nickname for that expression, Tenya fell back to the classic strategy of "DENY EVERYTHING"). This was serious business, which meant random quizzes over the next few weeks about the material he'd cover.

"Alright. Let me tell you what being a pro hero is today."

Tensei sighed and rubbed his nose. The truth hurt, and being a celebrity a constant drain with no end in sight.

"It's basically a spectator sport. Any dreams you had of saving people in burning buildings from some evil villains pretty much never happens nowadays. You saw the debacle where Mt. Lady debuted, right? Four pro heroes showed up to take down one villain, and there was a fight about who got the credit!"

"All Might might just be the one hero that's still completely serious about the whole heroism business. He also has enough power and fame to make it work though, so no one really gets on his case. However, that's not the reality for the holders of Ingenium."

First, let me tell you about a few other agencies, so that you can roughly understand what the average truly pro agency requires. Endeavour, the No. 2 hero has such an abrasive personality he should never be allowed near any advertisements, so his agency subsists off of getting paid for settling cases by the government, and action figure sales. Unfortunately, because Endeavour apparently was never forced into taking etiquette classes for advertisements, he's an abrasive jerk who acts pretty much as he pleases, no matter how much everyone hates his attitude."

Tensei snapped his fingers.

"Speaking of which – yours is next Thursday, don't forget it like you 'forgot' the two years ago."

"I forgot once, okay?"

Tenya's pout was still absolutely hilarious to Tensei, no matter how many times he saw it. Luckily, his socialization training allowed him to completely hide his laughter (no it didn't), so why was Tenya pouting more?

"Heh. Loosen up a bit, okay? I know that's how you respond when you're nervous, but most people aren't out to bite your head off; it'll be fine. It's your biggest issue in etiquette classes, from what I hear. Anyways, moving on."

"Another example is Mt. Lady's new agency. Because Mt. Lady herself pretty much can't do any sort of villain fight not in spacious areas, or have any finesse in disaster relief, she needs to get all the money she can get from advertisements and endorsements, while also being seen at as many villain fights as possible, just to get paid. Come to think of it, that's probably why she chose her outfit the way she did, not that I'm complaining. I mean, look at all that skin and those cur-"

"Tensei!"

Teasing his brother was way too much fun.

"What? It's true, unlike Thirteen, who covers herself up in a spacesuit. Hmph."

"Speaking of which, Thirteen's agency shows up to disasters rather than villain fights, and mostly gets paid by the government, with a few advertisements, which are paid by the government search and rescue department, just to show that being a hero who focuses on rescues is totally viable."

"So the government's paying for her everything, then."

"Yeah, pretty much."

"Alright, how does this all tie back to Ingenium? Well, the thing is, I've run Team IDATEN to handle all of the above. Personally, as Ingenium, I'm the figurehead, the one that always has to show up to the news conferences, press releases, advertisements, and so on. I'd like to be able to show off some of the other sidekicks whenever possible, like but usually they'll put in a demand to see Ingenium personally. Let me make this clear, Tenya."

A pregnant pause filled the air. Tensei's eyes sharpened, no longer Tenya's brother or even Ingenium the smiling Turbo Hero, but Ingenium about to give one of his subordinates a supremely serious lecture.

"Do not let this attention get to your head."

Tensei took a deep breath.

"That's what happened to Grandpa, and we love him, but it's taken a long time to pick Team IDATEN and the name of Ingenium up from where it fell thanks to his inflated ego."

The Todorokis still hadn't forgiven the Iida for that insult, and Tenya and Tensei were secretly in agreement with the Todorokis.

"As the head of Team IDATEN, there are generally two field divisions with IDATEN that you need to know: Search Branch, and Ground Branch. The skills that we use for villain captures are often the same ones used in disaster relief, so we can usually switch between them at will. Search Branch will usually coordinate with the Van to direct the Ground Branch and you. You'll have to coordinate with the branches to come up with a plan, though worst comes to worst the Van will come up with one for you."

"Team IDATEN usually shines when either in planned takedowns or coordinated rescue ops. Large villain groups by and large just don't exist, and the groups that tend to show up to those takedowns don't tend to like having IDATEN run the show."

"Speaking of which; in large groups with multiple hero agency, Team IDATEN is usually deferred to, unless someone's trying to snub us or establish themselves. Don't let them – or at least, try to be subtle and voice everything as a suggestion until they're eating out of your hand. The exception to this guideline is as usual, All Might."

"All Might? Doesn't he just smash everything?"

"That's what I thought too, until I looked at the casualty reports. Every single rescue or villain takedown that he's shown up to have zero casualties after he shows up, and he's second only to Endeavour in the amount of incidents he's resolved."

"I also had the good fortune of serving with him a few times, and at first his tactics all looks like a series of improbable circumstances, things like a building that was about to fall on a civilian get blown away by Fatgum's charged attack, and the pieces of the building juggled by Snipe as he attempted to shoot the villain Fatgum had knocked in the air while All Might himself used the midair pieces of concrete one at a time as ammunition against another villain. When I asked him what his plan was if Fatgum was out of position, he responded that he would have stepped in for a moment, and if Snipe wasn't there Endeavour would have blasted the concrete aiming for the villains, and there was really no reason to worry."

"Bottom line, that guy is the most terrifyingly intelligent coordinator I have ever had the good fortune of meeting as well as having an insanely powerful quirk. If you ever happen to find anybody he respects, it would serve you well to respect them too."

"Anyway, you need to learn to coordinate with multiple heroes against villains and keep as many people as you can alive as the leader of Team IDATEN, as well as work with the police to ensure smooth handling. I'll help you in the beginning, but it's not all that different from all the hero fights you've been imagining since you were three."

Tenya blushed again. Tensei wondered if he should push for a record number of blushes.

"Come on, I'm your older brother, as well as a living, breathing, representation of pro heroes, of course I know you've been staging hero fights since you were three."

"T-that was a long time ago, okay? I grew out of it!"

"Sure, sure you did, Tenya." Tensei chuckled.

Regardless, we've got a lot of footage from all the after action reports that everyone in the field hates me for except for that one masochist in the Search Branch, so we can review those, speed them up or pause them to discuss tactics. You'll start by directing things at school, and you've already demonstrated a wonderful aptitude for leadership in middle school, so between your pedigree and your current leadership skills there shouldn't be a problem."

Tensei made a gentle shooing motion.

"So, Tenya, off to bed. I know you're excited; the chair vibrating a whole foot away from the table is proof enough of that. You'll need energy for the upcoming days though, because you'll only have one chance to impress on everyone what I already know:

The Fourth will be better than I ever was."

Tenya felt the tears welling up. He was ready, and almost shot out of his chair (no wait he did shoot out of his chair, that's what the tumbling sound was) in his hurry to go to bed and get some rest so that he could impress his classmates and –

"Tenya. Wait. You can become doesn't mean you're ready yet."

Those tears suddenly streaked down Tenya's face for a different reason. W-Why? What had he done wrong? Was he a disappointment, like he always knew he was since he failed to master such a basic skill as turning with his quirk on?

"Your grasp of your quirk is excellent. Your problems with restraining yourself go away when you're not nervous, so that really can't be helped except by exposure like you're already about to do.

But.

Your biggest problems are that you don't ask enough questions to make sure of something, your drive comes from where I'm sitting rather than from where you are, and you want to be a pro, not a pro hero. Think on those, and I'll tell you when you're ready to take the name."

Tenya dried his tears and set his face, nodding sharply. He would become worthy.


	3. Chapter 2: Crowded Start

**Chapter 2: Crowded Start**

"Don't put your feet on the desk!"

"Huh?" Bakugou responded, smirking. Clearly a hooligan, his demeanor, from the dirty blond hair, smirk, and feet on the desk that was _oh so annoying_ , radiated smugness.

"Don't you think it's rude to the UA upperclassmen and the people who made the desk?!"

"Nope. Which middle school did you go to, you two bit extra?" Iida recoiled, shocked. There was rude, and then there was being unbearably narcisstic, which Bakugou seemed to have slid into even more than the sparkling Yuga kid. ( _wait where did that sparkling come from_ )

"I attended Somei Private Academy. My name is Tenya Iida." Iida put his hands over his heart and made small gestures with his other hand as if to punctuate his sentence, but those gestures ended up being mostly nonsensical.

"Somei? So you're an _elite_ , huh? Looks like I'll have fun crushing you." He was taken aback, again, at Bakugou's hostility, sneering, and bloodlust, grin stretching out in a toothy promise of future pain. He didn't want to call just anybody a sociopath, but it almost fit here.

"'Crushing'?! What hostility! Are you really aiming to be a hero?"

Bakugou huffed, in a clear dismissal of what Iida had to say. He glanced to the door, and what he saw made his eyes go wide, and his frame shake with anger. Iida glanced in the direction that Bakugou was looking at, trying to see what had made Bakugou react with such anger.

In the doorway was the green haired kid, who had demonstrated overwhelming power and heroism, the aspect to the test that Iida had only realized in hindsight.

Really, it should have been more obvious that the entrance exam for _heroism_ of all things graded you on how heroic you were, and of course they wouldn't tell you heroism was graded, otherwise everyone would pretend to be a hero. They even made the zero point villain not worth your time and effort to take down except for the purposes of demonstrating heroism.

Regardless, when under stress, this kid had figured out what Iida, a proud graduate of Somei Private Academy and eventual aspirant to the title of Ingenium the Turbo Hero, had not. And for this alone Iida realized that he had misjudged him.

Best move quickly then.

"Good morning! I'm Iida Tenya from Somei –" Iida moved across the classroom, dragging everyone's gaze to the door, where a plain looking boy with distinctive green hair was standing in the doorway.

"Oh yeah, I, uh, overheard. Uh… I'm Midoriya, nice to meet you Iida…" Midoriya said, edging away from the huge overenthusiastic teenager who was getting uncomfortably close as he approached. Iida thought it was the proper distance for a handshake.

"Midoriya, you realized there was something more to that practical exam, didn't you? I had no idea … I misjudged you. Much as I'd prefer not to say it, you are better than I am." Iida declared, wincing at the thought. His hands were still moving nonsensically, but Midoriya could deal with this.

"I really didn't realize though…" Midoriya nervously muttered. Such humility too!

"Oh, that curly hair! You're the plain looking one!" said the girl from yesterday. Brown locks curling around her head as a rounded frame, puffing out around her ears, but otherwise entirely plain. Definitely an accent there, probably came from the countryside, but her quirk was really powerful if given the time to develop.

"You passed, just like Present Mic said!" Wait, what? Was that kid's passing ever in doubt? Displaying such power and depth of insight? Top ten hero wasn't far off for this kid.

"Of course you did! Your punch was amazing!" The girl made a sort of slash with a closed fist to emphasize her point, but with the sheer power that Midoriya had, he could probably still make it work.

"Oh, well, um –"

"Break!"

"it was thanks to you – "

"Break!"

"going to speak –"

"Bre-"

Iida felt intensely grateful to his parents and especially his older brother forcing him to have his awkwardness in middle school ( _"go get 'em, tiger!" Tensei said, pushing him into the crowd_ ) rather than have it on display like this Midoriya kid was.

(He studiously ignored the sniggers that seemed to start up every time he moved his hands.)

"Huh? How did you know about that?" That was a fair point the girl raised. Wasn't this sort of thing supposed to be anonymous? Asking the teacher for a favor to another student didn't really strike Iida as the kind of thing that was really publicized.

"Oh, uh, that's because…" In the span of a few short seconds, Iida found himself intensely grateful to Tensei for forcing him into those parties. Again. Was he ever this bad?

(Tensei had a whole photo album to prove that yes, yes he was.)

"I wonder if today's just the entrance ceremony and orientation?" The girl was excited, pumping her arms up in anticipation. Iida really felt bad for the Midoriya. To have it so bad he was trying (ineffectively) to cover his face with his arms and have his whole face go pink? Iida found himself in Tensei's debt forever. He needed to pay Tensei back tenfold, despite his earlier complaints and embarrassments.

"I wonder what our teacher's like?" Oh? That was a good point. Iida didn't know who his teacher was – though to be fair, he didn't know half the class (he counted! Three times!) so it was probably reasonable not to know the teacher.

"Aren't you nervous?" Was Midoriya actually mouthing at Iida "So close.."? Iida suddenly had a flash of insight: He would pay Tensei back by paying the favor forward! Brilliant! Iida saw no possible way this could go wrong.

"Go somewhere else if you want to play at being friends." The voice came from the floor, out of a head sticking out of a sleeping bag. It was barely above a whisper, but more importantly, he had come around the empty hallway without either the girl noticing or making any sort of distinguishable sound. That took some serious stealth skills, one this teacher must have been using as a lesson! Truly, UA was on another level, giving lessons on awareness before the class had even begun!

Actually, could someone like Bakugou be a plant on the behalf of UA, as a demonstration for how to deal with unreasonable heroes? Iida would have to think on this some more.

"This is the hero course." The person on the ground unzipped his dull yellow sleeping bag a little from the inside (how had that worked without being obvious? His quirk?) to pull out some sort of container, that looked like the squeeze bags that toddlers drank out of.

"S-Something's here?!" Was this our teacher? Or was it some lout that was our lesson on villain disposal?

The yellow sleeping bag man stood up. Iida couldn't help but feel impressed. He had stood up with no leverage whatsoever, and had stood up at a slow pace. That must have taken incredible skills, or musculature, but based on unzipping the sleeping bag from inside, was probably some sort of telekinesis quirk, and a powerful one at that. Perhaps that was what the sleeping bag was for, to hide what he did to focus his powers like that.

If he actually had the raw power to do it without something to focus his powers, Iida figured he'd be a top ten hero, not teaching at UA. After all, it wasn't like many famous heroes spent their time at UA, and certainly not any current top ten heroes, right?

"Okay, it took eight seconds for you all to quiet down. Time is limited. You kids lack common sense." The scruffy guy stepped out of the sleeping bag. His hands were empty, but that could have been just the results of his telekinesis. But… he had said that we needed to calm down and that we lacked common sense. Only a teacher or an older student would really care about that. Iida also knew that this class didn't mix grades, so…

Could this scruffy guy be his teacher?

"I'm your homeroom teacher, Shota Aizawa. Nice to meet you." So he was the teacher. And moreover, he was the homeroom teacher. Just when Iida thought he would have a great (maybe just good because he antagonized Bakugou the secret test) day at school, this scruffy guy had to be his homeroom teacher, and tell him that he had failed a hidden test.

"It's kind of sudden, but put this on and go out onto the field." W-What? Take an athletic jersey, get to the practice field as fast as you can? Maybe it was a field orientation?

-o-

"QUIRK ASSESSMENT TEST!?" This… this beggared belief. Hadn't the entire class (aside from the recommended students) already taken a practical exam to get in? Why was there another test?

"What about the entrance ceremony? The orientation?" These were practically staples of new school life, what had happened at UA that they just cut those out? The girl was probably right to be worried about their absence.

"If you're going to be a hero, you don't have time for such leisurely events." Was the state of the world really that desperate, that the top hero school couldn't afford to have so much as an orientation? All the heroes had been doing recently was winning – there wasn't a villain in sight that didn't get beaten down quickly and efficiently nowadays. Maybe that was the real lesson? A lesson that one must hurry to become a hero to be able to even put food on the table? Iida had heard of Mount Lady's difficulty in financing, because her Giant Size quirk ensured massive property damage that she always had to pay for.

"UA's selling point is how unrestricted its school traditions are. That's also how the teachers run their classes." Was this another lesson? A lesson to be unpredictable? Or was it just what it seemed and their class was the only one to get stuck with a bad teacher?

"You kids have been doing these since middle school, too, right? Physical fitness tests where you weren't allowed to use your quirks. The country still uses averages taken from results where students didn't use their quirk. Doesn't make sense. Well, the Ministry of Education is procrastinating." That… actually made sense. When had the world flipped upside down? Iida was so sure he had kept track of the horizon, too…

"Bakugou, how far could you pitch a softball in middle school?"

"67 meters."

"Try using your quirk this time. As long as you don't exit the circle, anything you do is fine." The throwing range was pointed out, but it only looked like it went out to two hundred meters at maximum. How did he plan on measuring?

"Don't hold back."

"You got it." Before the attempt, he stretched out, and then started to thrown.

His left arm blasted his torso into rotating, hard. His feet managed to stay level, so that his torso whipcracked around. His right hand sounded like it had already broken the sonic barrier when he let off a second explosion concentrated in the palm of his hand, accelerating the softball further.

"DIIIIEEE!" The ball flew off his fingertips in an impressive explosion, rapidly overshadowed by the softball leaving four rings in its wake, seemingly trailing flames at the sheer speed it was traveling.

Also; die? That wasn't very heroic, lending further credence to the theory that Bakugou was secretly a UA plant.

The ball had finally touched the ground, and bounced along for another fifty meters. Question answered, Iida supposed, about how Aizawa meant to track how far the ball had gone. Of course it came down to the ball and the measuring device.

(Incidentally, Bakugou had thrown the ball 705.2 meters, but who's counting?)

"Before anything else, one must know what they're capable of. This is a common sense metric that will form the basis of your heroics."

"Awesome! That looks so fun!"

"705 meters! Unbelievable!"

"We can use our Quirks as much as we want! As expected from the hero course!"

Everybody was visibly excited, so Aizawa naturally felt the need to cut them all back down to size.

"'It looks fun', huh? You have three years to become a hero. Will you keep up that attitude that whole time?"

Silence. Aizawa ran his hand through his thrice damned hair, which just would not cooperate with him in making a reasonable haircut.

"All right. Whoever I judge to have no potential, will be punished with expulsion."

"Huh?!" Shock rippled out through the crowd. Iida felt more than he saw the tone shifting, but he knew from his gut that his teacher was completely serious. There would be no point in complaining, only bracing for the tests.

"We're free to do whatever we want to our students. Welcome to UA, Department of Heroics!"

The silence seemed to hang there, as the crowd passed through shock, denial, anger, and just hit bargaining when the girl spoke up.

"Whoever you judge has no potential!? This is our first day here! But even if it weren't, that's just too unreasonable!"

Iida knew it was pointless to argue, but apparently there were still people who hadn't gotten the memo yet. Shame too, because her quirk was wasted in the hands of a complainer.

"Natural disasters… Massive accidents… Ego mad villains… All kinds of calamities can happen when we least expect them. Japan is covered with unfairness. Heroes are the ones who reverse those situations."

Aizawa had everyone's attention now. His tone, and complete ease with saying implied that he had been there, and that his words were an inevitability that he had lived through.

"If you wanted to go to McDonald's with your friends, too bad. For the next three years, UA will do all it can to give one challenge after another. So go further beyond.

Plus Ultra.

Overcome it with all you got, and be ready to give the next one everything you got and ten percent more."

Iida grabbed his water bottle. Aizawa's demeanor was too serious for all his words to just be hazing – he was entirely serious. Therefore he had to be hydrated – it wouldn't do to get a cramp in the middle of these trials. This was the best of the best. There was no place of retreat, no comfort zone he could go to and still surpass his brother. He had to do it.

"All right, demonstration's over. The real thing starts now."


	4. Chapter 3: Expanding Pack

**Chapter 3: Expanding Pack**

Iida was expecting more. Honestly, the Villain Capture with Aizawa as the Hero was an excellent opportunity to see how all the other heroes would handle infiltration (Tooru, the girl that was _always invisible_ won by a landslide), and the 50 meter cavalry race was a good demonstration for applied use of quirks, and the 15 minute endurance run was a good way to check everyone's endurance without being too useless (Mineta finished last there, to absolutely no one's surprise).

But softball toss? Was Aizawa just running out of ideas at this point? Sure, it was the very first demonstration, but you only really needed to look at the student's build and quirk before you could pretty much tell where their ball was going to land.

"Uraraka Ochaco. Distance: Indeterminate."

"What?! She got an Indeterminate?! Does that mean we can go beyond what you can record?"

"Next: Midoriya Izuku. You don't seem to have much potential, do you?"

What? Iida had been keeping track; Midoriya Izuku was solidly in the middle of the pack. He didn't excel in any areas, but he was certainly more fit than Tooru, outmaneuvered Mineta in the cavalry battle, and was notably good at Villain Capture, almost like he had played the "villain" in that game for the longest time.

Moreover, his quirk's power was utterly insane! Blowing back the zero pointer in the entrance exam! Iida almost wished he had that kind of power, if he didn't see what kind of cost Midoriya had paid for it. He didn't expect Midoriya to be able to use his quirk more than once when he used it, so maybe it all balanced out.

"'Course not! He's a worthless _quirkless_ guppy!" Bakugou seemed to have a massive hatred towards Midoriya, and something seemed off. Iida couldn't quite put his finger on it.

"'Quirkless'?! Did you not see what he did in the entrance exam?!" Iida mentally cursed. His mouth had run off at the UA plant! On the other hand, the UA plant was antagonizing another, powerful hero, so was it possible that Iida had done the right thing in standing up for him? He would have to think on this some more.

"67 meters." Iida's thought process came to a screeching halt. Actually, on second thought, train wreck would be a better descriptor. He was sure that Midoriya's arm was glowing that time – why hadn't it moved the ball farther?

"I erased your quirk." If this wasn't a test, Iida would bite his collar. He was probably doing that anyway as a nervous tic, but Iida didn't let small details like that bother him. Now, which pro hero had a quirk that erased quirks? It probably had something to do with "Eraser"… Eraserhead!

That explained a lot. He was probably bribed into coming to teach at UA on the proviso that Nedzu the principal, along with the collective efforts of the UA hero agency, would help him find suitable targets to take down. He also didn't have a large public spotlight shined on him like All Might did, so he could afford to simply disappear from the crimefighting scene and no one would ask questions.

"It doesn't make sense. How did you expect to be a hero if you cripple yourself every time you use your quirk? There won't always be another hero to get you out of harm's way."

Iida recognized that tone of voice. His brother had used it when dispensing life advice, such as "Iida, don't do all nighters" and "Iida, always listen to your mom and don't make her angry" and "Iida, never respond when someone throws their underwear at you, it doesn't end well," at which point Mom demonstrated why Tensei had told Iida to never make mom angry, by inflicting that most cruel of tortures on Tensei (judging by his reaction). Revoking his running shoe privileges.

(Iida only managed to be properly horrified after several minutes of prodding to look more horrified.)

It was the tone of voice which spoke from experience, of a bad time previously had. Aizawa sounded like he had been in a situation where the heroes lost; that hadn't happened in decades! Was he really that old?

(He had a small inkling in his mind. Something was trying to get his attention, a memory from five years ago, when Tensei came home, listless. For a while, Tensei hadn't smiled at all, hadn't even responded for several days.)

Aizawa closed his eyes.

"I've given you your quirk back…try throwing the ball again. Let's get this over with."

Midoriya looked like he had his body trained, but not his quirk. That was an inversion from what usually happened. Could he have come into his quirk lately? All the signs seemed to point to that, and Iida had never heard of someone getting their quirk so late, but statistics indicated eventually someone would come into their quirk that late, so that was probably the case.

Iida nodded sharply. Wait, when had his hand came up under his chin?

"He's gonna get expelled for sure."

Huh, the UA plant seemed to have an oddly large obsession with Midoriya. Almost as if he had a preexisting grudge against the kid. No, that didn't seem right. UA was the pinnacle of education, there's no way they would hire a plant with a grudge against some random kid, that'd fail to live up the reputation of UA, and therefore this was all a hidden test of character.

Midoriya began mumbling again, as was quickly becoming his character trait. Iida only caught snatches of it, segments like "I…power…stake…adjusting…pitch?No…can't…short…time…shit…".

Midoriya began his windup. It was the exact same scenario from last time, Aizawa noted. It was a shame too – this was the first student that All Might had taken an interest in, and to be such a disappointment. Aizawa shrugged, in such a small motion it was almost purely mental, and prepared to activate his quirk.

And then Midoriya failed to activate the quirk. His arm had started the forward motion, but One For All was nowhere to be seen.

His arm passed his torso. One For All didn't activate. Was Midoriya trying to prove something by not using his quirk?

…

Iida's mind quickly raced to put together what he had just seen. It was a flash, followed by a sonic boom, as the air screamed from the ball crushing a hole through the atmosphere.

Midoriya clenched his fist, with a broken and burnt finger, turned his head, tears welling in his eyes, and told Aizawa:

"I can still move."

Grimacing in pain, eyes shining, he jogged off the field.

This was the second time Iida had been wrong about Midoriya. He would have to think on this some more.


	5. Chapter 4: Now's Not The Time For That!

**Chapter 4: Now's Not The Time For That!**

Aizawa smiled gently. Nodding his head, so sharply it looked like a jerk, he said:

"Alright kids, we're done here."

"What?!","What about the other trials?!","What do we do for the rest of the day?!" rang out.

"I judge you all to have the bare minimum of potential, so we're all heading in to have our actual welcoming ceremony."

Iida could have sworn Aizawa muttered under his breath, "Midnight'll kill me if I keep 'em any later. Sheesh, that woman doesn't make sense."

Bakugou, who had been tensing up ever since Midoriya had thrown the ball, finally exploded when Aizawa had passed them.

" _ **DEKU YOU FU-**_ "

Whatever he was going to say was interrupted by Aizawa's "scarf" unraveling and whipping itself across Bakugou's mouth, limbs, and eyes, in a practiced motion that screamed "I have done this a thousand times and have done it to some idiot who tried to attack me in my sleep". In his same monotone voice reverberating through the emptiness in his eyes, he said:

"Do not attack your fellow heroes for demonstrating higher power and better judgement. You are dangerously close to having no potential."

Silence echoed. Even the birds had shut up.

"Now come along, aspirants. We need to go quickly."

Iida had a realization. Aizawa could not attack fellow staff. Therefore, Bakugou was not a plant. So where had he gone wrong?

-o-

It was inevitable that someone was going to start something in the group walking towards the auditorium. Sure, Aizawa could go up to "everybody needs a new pair of pants scary", but usually he was pretty laidback. However, this social pressure could not last if they all wanted to bond together, which his brother had said was one of the most important things to do in high school, so he took it upon himself to break the ice.

"…Ochaco, you heard Aizawa too, right?" Iida demonstrated he could do discreet, much to the surprise of Kaminari, who groaned as he forked over cash to Jirou. Yayorozu then confiscated the money, bending over slightly as she wagged her finger and told them not to gamble at school as the other big goody two shoes in the class. Mineta suddenly had blood spurting from his nose, for which Tooru handed him her handkerchief. Some unspeakable things involving Mineta and Tooru's handkerchief later, Tooru got her reddened handkerchief back, and Mineta had a black eye. All this drama, however, was completely ignored by Iida and Ochaco whispering to each other.

"Yeah, I did. Think they're together? They did announce they'd be teaching together…"

"Maybe. Could it be a famous open relationship? Midnight does need to keep the rest of her sidekicks with her somehow…"

In the background, Mineta was now somehow bleeding out of both noses. Tsuyu, having an idea of exactly what he was thinking, slapped him with her tongue from four feet away. Mineta, after some thought, promptly had even more blood gush out of his nose, at which point he fainted of blood loss. None of the girls particularly wanted to touch him, and the guys didn't want associate with him either. So of course the job fell to Sero, who could at least bandage him remotely and drag his body behind him, using the tape that came out of his joints. Nobody wanted to touch Mineta directly after what he did to Tooru's handkerchief.

Iida was cheering inside. He had done it! The ice was now a melting puddle in the warm sunshine of class bonding, and okay that metaphor went on for way too long, but it had worked!

(He was resolutely ignoring the part of him that said the rest of the class had already bonded.)

"That makes sense." Ochaco nodded, before doing something incredibly stupid.

"GOOD LUCK WITH MIDNIGHT, MR. AIZAWA!"

Mineta twitched. Aizawa instantly faced the group, red eyes in full burst, hair flowing up and his "scarf" suddenly started whipping around.

It all came together to make his simmering, whisper quiet monotone incredibly intimidating.

"Who said that?"

Iida quickly weighed his options. On the one hand, Ochaco had entirely deserved this. On the other hand, he couldn't just abandon a friend like this.

Midoriya solved the problem for him.

"I-It was me, sir."

Something was trying to get Iida's attention again. That admission sounded practiced. But it flickered, in and out, and he ended up giving up on that stray thought that kept him slightly uneasy around Midoriya.

"Bullshit. Ochaco, you… please don't make assumptions like that. Your assumption doesn't make sense. If you find yourself ever believing something you've just thought of, don't trust it. That kind of trust in one's capabilities doesn't make sense. Always check your assumptions. It's the only action that makes sense."

Aizawa had Ochaco pinned under his eyes. She still had her quirk, but the whole class felt the sheer pressure he was exerting, and they weren't even the focus. Ochaco, for her part, was staying remarkably composed, but her entire posture seemed to scream "this smile is plastered on, pleasedon'tkillme".

"That goes for the rest of you, too."

And with a sweep of his eyes, everyone briefly felt that focused pressure. It was terrifying. Iida had made a mistake when he had thought to break the ice. Whatever he did, it probably wasn't worth that feeling twice.

Then Aizawa turned his head down. His scarf came back down, loosely disheveled around his neck, and his hair came down to an unkempt bird's nest.

"Iida, good work on breaking the ice. Midoriya, your bravery and loyalty is appreciated, but I value honesty more."

Aizawa nodded sharply towards them, a clear sign of his approval. That seemed to relax the students somewhat, so, oh so slowly, the group picked up towards the auditorium.

Ochaco and Midoriya were becoming fast friends. Iida smiled, and slotted in beside Midoriya.

-o-

Midnight was standing outside of the auditorium, with the most plastered on smile Iida had ever seen on anybody, which was surprising to him, after seeing Aizawa's terrifying display and Ochaco's smile through that.

"Where have my cute little students been, Aizawa dear?"

Midnight forced so much artificial sweetness into her voice that half the class gagged. The other half tried to keep the laughter from winning out, and Rikido Sato suddenly had his musculature inflate and deflate just as rapidly as he seemed to realize that sweetness was entirely artificial.

The iron vice her arms described around Aizawa's neck made clear he was in for a world of hurt.

"We're going to have a nice long talk in the teacher's lounge with the nice beast Nedzu. It's not going to be too long or hard, but both of us agreed it's going to hurt a bit down there. Probably not as much as it did your first time though…"

Midnight was almost sultry, but the headlock ruined most of that effect. Aizawa, face rapidly paling past deathly white, merely squeaked out:

"please don't touch my bags…"

As Aizawa was dragged away by Midnight, going so white his skin was almost see-through, the whole class just stood there, in shock. Nobody knew what to do.

Which is why All Might promptly came skidding down the hallway, shouting his most famous line.

"Go inside! Why? Because I am here!"


	6. Chapter 5: The Finish Line Is THAT Far?

**Chapter Five: The Finish Line Is THAT Far?!**

Present Mic had finally finished his speech, and Iida didn't feel like he missed much. That was to be expected, but some serious questions were raised when the entire Class 1A came in not ten minutes before his speech ended and no one thought they missed anything.

"One more thing: Hero Course, go to the stage once we're done! Now everyone, say it with me!"

" _ **PLUS ULTRA!"**_ The stadium shook with the primal roar of a thousand students.

"Dismissed!"

Iida still wasn't used to Present Mic switching languages midsentence. At this rate, he wasn't sure if he ever would get used to that. Then Iida connected the dots, and realized this was a test, like how the entrance exam graded heroism without mentioning it. Suddenly, Present Mic's behavior made sense. After all, sometimes one would need to deal with first responders, and in very large events one might have to work with foreign responders who wouldn't be communicating in their language.

Truly, UA was a top tier school, if it could communicate so much with so little!

The students though…the students left something to be desired. What kind of elite students pushed each other down the stairs to see who'd get to the bottom first?

After the flashmob racing down the stairs had deposited all the constituent bodies on the floor (Iida debated whether taking pictures would be in bad taste) and the rest of the course had caught up, Present Mic stepped off.

Out stepped All Might.

The squabbling, snickering, and whispers cut out, tripping over themselves in a desperate attempt to stop in his presence.

That was really the only word for it: Presence.

Announcing to the world that All Might was here.

His slick golden corduroy suit and pants that matched his unique hairstyle, so often mocked by channels that had long since run out of content, all seemed coherent, attention grabbing, and awe inspiring in his presence.

The Symbol of Peace gazed, and everyone felt the guarantee in his smile.

 _You will be a hero._

"Students, potential heroes. I imagine you've had some talk from your homeroom teacher about what it means to be a hero. Maybe some from your siblings or family.

About the work that it takes, and how maybe you should take the easier route, slack off a little on your studies here and there. You don't really don't need to put in all that effort right?"

Some winced. Tenya grit his teeth and began limbering up.

"Let me introduce three people that should make why the effort is worth it extremely clear.

Hado, Amajiki, and – Togata, please step up."

Three older students ( _seniors, maybe?_ ) stepped up. One of them was a ray of sunshine, another bouncing around, looking for anything interesting, and the last one…

The last one reminded Iida a lot of Aizawa. The whole chronically sleep deprived, bird's nest for hair, and "need to be away from people" look.

"These are UA's famous Big Three, and some say that Togata here might be equal to any pro in the top ten!"

(Left obviously unsaid was that All Might wasn't a pro so much as a living legend.)

Togata somehow glowed even brighter. Hado was starting to open her mouth, but Amajiki grabbed her arm to stop her.

"Now, Togata, Amajiki, Hado? Go ahead and cut loose. Don't make Recovery Girl mad."

Amajiki rolled his eyes. Hado sharpened almost imperceptibly, and bounced to Amajiki's side. Mirio kept smiling.

"All right, who wants to be fir-"

Bakugou already had his hand in Mirio's face.

"DIE!"

An orange flash, and … silence?

Where had the noise gone?

Actually, where was Mirio?

Then Amajiki exploded into tentacles, and there was no more time for thinking.

-o-

The doorbell was chiming in a cute little song that Iida had long since grown out of, but was still playing because Tensei wanted it, despite having a key to the house. He was childish like that.

Iida considered getting out of bed. Really. He weighed the pros and cons carefully (if I get up it'll hurt, if I don't it won't) and decided to stay in bed. He was battered all over, but given a few days where he didn't have to do anything strenuous (Aizawa was laughing his ass off somewhere) he should be fine.

Tensei chose this moment to let himself into Iida's room.

"All Might handled your orientation?"

"Yeah. I thought UA was supposed to be a proper, upright school. What happened to prim and proper morals, anyway?"

Tensei chuckled.

"The hero course has always been a far more hands on, everything you've got and a little bit more deal. It was when I went there, and judging by how you can't even move without wincing, it still is. Who beat you down?"

"Some upperclassmen…think it was some kinda crazy teleporter, a wall of tentacles, and blue hair?"

Both winced.

"Oh man, they did not go easy on you guys. Our class just fought Snipe, and he was pretty gentle about it."

"Wait, Snipe? Isn't he famous among heroes for causing permanent injury when he doesn't kill?"

"He was playing nice, using rubber bullets. Still hurt, but definitely got across the point of not tripping over each other's feet, since most of the injuries were from each other and not Snipe."

"Oh. I got knocked out by the wall of tentacles."

"Huh. Let me guess what happened; Hado and Amajiki were standing in one row, and Togata was out in front. Someone attacked Togata, who vanished into the ground. That poor sap, now at pointblank range to both Amajiki and Hado, was grabbed by Amajiki, and that kicked off the fight."

Tenya shut his mouth. Tensei would be lecturing for a good while yet.

"From there, Hado would have cancelled pretty much every vibrational based attack, or redirected it into their allies. Considering vibrational attacks include sonic and overpressure from explosions, this would have removed nearly all the potential ranged attacks. Amajiki meanwhile, as a gigantic tentacle monster, would have subdued everybody near him, which for Amajiki means everybody within ten meters. Of course, Togata would have attacked a random person first, then with new information about who was throwing around what, would have gone for the squishy ranged attackers next."

"Long story short, you guys were totally screwed. Any one of them would have taken both classes down single handedly; I wonder what All Might was thinking in setting up such a ridiculous challenge. Was he trying to demoralize you all?"

Tenya's nod was best interpreted as "all of the above".

"Anyway, I want to hear your thoughts on what went wrong first." Tensei finished speaking, gulping down air.

"Me? I got taken out pretty much instantly – I don't have much to say. But okay, I'll try."

"As a class, there was no coordination. We weren't fighting together; it was forty people tripping over themselves to be the first to take a swing at a very strong group. The fight started when Bakugou interrupted Togata's 'come at me' with an explosion to the face, and nobody else was talking to each other at all."

"We should have been talking to each other about what we could do, or at least assumed some loose formation to make things work. Somebody should have held back Bakugou to keep him from starting the fight early. That is all that I can currently think of." Tenya crisply reported. He'd punctuate his explanation with relevant hand gestures, but stopped immediately after trying to gesture earned him a stab in the wrist.

Tensei nodded.

"Not bad. You don't have much experience, so that's probably about the extent of what you could analyze. A few other things that would have been helpful: High ground, unit cohesion, and better threat prioritization."

"In terms of high ground – you had four, theoretically five, people that could make their own, and only three that could do it safely for some one else. The Todoroki this year is said to be better at ice powers than any of the previous Todoroki children; you should have reached out to him because he can make a high ground that can observe people moving in it easily. I know we have a "rivalry" with the Todorokis, and some of the sticks in the mud think we should 'hate each other', but that's no excuse for not socializing with him at all. Uraraka was another example of giving others high ground – you said you were friends, so you really had no excuse not to work with her. Yayorozu is an interesting case because it wouldn't be much of a high ground, but nevertheless it wouldn't hurt to interact with her more. This would have helped you against Togata, as he does not in fact possess teleportation or invisibility; his real quirk is to phase through objects. Since he would have to pass through a bit of air or clear ice, you would have had time to react to him approaching your high ground, as well as better defend against Amajiki."

"For unit cohesion, you probably could have made a three man cell, with you, Midoriya, and Ochaco forming an incredibly fast moving, ridiculously hard hitting group. Again, if you're friends you should have been doing this already. That team composition's biggest weakness would be the perceptive ability to keep up with such speed and power; I am unsure of who would fit in that slot. However, you would have a significantly better chance to at least take one of them down, as none of your quirks in tandem require manipulatable shockwaves, staying close to the ground, or could be stopped by a bunch of tentacles."

"Lastly, in terms of threat prioritization, you misidentified the threat levels. _"Blue Hair"_ as you called her was the most dangerous combatant on the team, as she had battlefield control and outright reflected a large majority of your attacks. Let this be a lesson; if someone's doing something and you can't figure out what they're doing, they are supremely dangerous, because you won't know what to expect. Amajiki was the next most dangerous threat, because while he was there you couldn't strike at Hado or really win against his close combat prowess. Togata, contrary to your expectations, was the least dangerous threat, because for all that his incredible speed made him seem like he could hit multiple targets at once, at heart he's an incredibly efficient single combatant, and he doesn't have All Might's ability to switch between the roles at will. He was capable of picking off people, but those people tended to be people that Amajiki and Hado could have already handled – he didn't materially change the outcome, just the victory margin. Remember that threat ratings for individuals fighting with groups is entirely different from individuals alone; Nedzu one on one is a relatively easy opponent if you can force him into combat and don't let him trap you, but in a group he's the most dangerous combatant bar strategic class combatants for his tactical ability. In the other direction, Endeavour is the number two hero one on one, but in a group he's almost a liability for how poorly he coordinates with other heroes. The distinction between threats in groups and individually is a critical one, and often needs to be learned through experience."

That about covers it. Think about it some more, and get ready for more, okay, Tenya?"

Tenya heard the words "get ready for more" and groaned.

Tensei snapped his fingers.

"By the way, between Endeavour's, Thirteen's, Gunhead's, and Mount Lady's agency, which is Team IDATEN most similar to?"

Tenya groaned more.


End file.
